The Society held a productive Committee meeting last night. Among many items discussed was the Programme with several speakers added for 2025, and the very successful “Studio Night” will be held on the 23rd April, it is proposed to have a live model again, and techniques of lighting, posing, and camera settings will be demonstrated. How is everyone progressing with this year’s annual project of “Numbers”? Next year’s annual project will be “Prime Time”, one photo each month to be taken with a fixed focal length prime lens, it should be a very creative project. A couple of Committee members have 105mm macro lenses, and it will be interesting to see what images can be obtained with these, I have a 56mm APS-C lens, 85mm full frame, that will be a challenge. A prime lens need not be an expensive acquisition, a new manual focus lens for your camera system can be purchased from Amazon for less than £70, TT Artisans, 7 Artisans, and Mieke manufacture a 25mm or 35mm lens at that price. As an alternative consider a M42 screw mount manual focus lens, you will need an adapter for your camera mount, (around £20) then on eBay branded lenses from Helios, and Pentacon, and Carl Zeis are available in several focal lengths. The Christmas Buffet, and quiz night will be held on the 18th December. The door entry charge will be £3 to cover the room hire, and cost of the buffet, Paul Malley has organised a quiz, Jane will be providing the buffet, which Graham will bring in, a raffle will be held by Harry Kerman, and he will need some prizes to be brought in on the night. These are some photos from last year’s buffet, so it should be a another good evening.

Good Morning All Firstly, I have my new computer up and running with the latest version of Elements so I can now edit again. What I have learnt is how important it is to back everything up which I will be doing in future. I have not managed to retrieve anything of my old computer yet but there is still hope that the hard drive is still ok and can be accessed by a specialist. The good news is I was also lazy deleting photographs on my camera's memory card, so I have 1150 photos to make a fresh start and as I have done a talk every year at the club, I have most of them still on memory sticks. Still plenty of bad news but think positive. I took the photograph of the Long-tailed tit at Linwood last Friday and is my first edited image on Elements 25. Last week at the club we held a minute's silence in memory of Paul Gray who sadly passed away recently and will be greatly missed by us all. The evening didn't really go to plan, firstly no heating then when we got heating the power tripped and no trip box could be found. It was a disappointment as it was PDI of the year and we had a judge attending from Barton. Gail judged the first three subjects on the night and the other three later at home. We now have the results, and they are on our website. Results are as follows Landscape 1st Dave Tuner - Calm before the storm, Loch Long 2nd Dave Turner - Trotternish Ridge sky 3rd Derek Smith Ilkley Moor Cow and Calf Nature 1st Paul Malley - Gryfalcon - just killing time 2nd Harry Kerman - Red Kite 3rd Derek Smith - Keeled Skimmer Highly commended Simon Millson - Brown Hare Photo/Journalism 1st Keith Rossington - Enjoying the ride 2nd Keith Rossington - Making a splash 3rd Paul Twomey - Matt Henry takes evasive action Pictorial 1st Dave Turner - Tower Bridge 2nd Harry Kerman - Iris 3rd Paul Twomey - Blickling Hall Portrait 1st Graham Harrison - The Warden 2nd Paul Malley - Alicia and Joe 3rd Keith Rossington - Ta Daa Record 1st Keith Rossington - The old bridge to the sea 2nd Derek Smith - Cranford in steam 3rd Dave Mann - Bath Overall PDI of the year Paul Malley with his nature photograph of a Gyrfalcon. just killing time Well done Paul, great photograph This week we have a committee meeting, committee members only to attend please. We have two meetings a year to keep steering the club going in the right direction and sort any events in the future. If anyone would like to attend the LPA day of photography in March, please let me know and I can order your tickets for you, It is £15 a ticket. Regards Graham

At our meeting last night we held the PDIOTY, (PDI of the Year) competition. The LPA President Gail Wrigg was the judge for the evening. The meeting room was unheated, and exceptionally cold, one of our members contacted a member of the church team who quickly provided some electric heaters to warm up the proceedings. Our judge Gail was doing a great job critiquing the images, and providing good feedback on each displayed image. Halfway through the evening it was time for a break, and the kettles were switched on; and all the power sockets tripped with the extra loading on the circuits. Members were unable to find the trip switch to reset the circuit, and so the evening ended with a tepid drink and we all went home. Our judge, Gail will review the remainder of the images on a memory stick, and report back with her conclusions.

We were all deeply saddened to learn that our friend, and colleague Paul Gray passed away on Saturday after a short illness. Paul was a quiet, humble, unassuming man who approached any task in a professional, diligent manner, and was not afraid to quietly speak up when something was incorrect. I was privileged to accompany Paul on several photographic shoots. Working together backstage at the Louth Riverside theatre photographing a Fleetwood Mac tribute band, where we obtained some excellent photos, firstly from the orchestral pit, and then from the wings as the band performed. Climbing Mam Tor, with Dave Turner, Paul, and myself in the pre-dawn dark to try and capture that iconic sunrise photo, unfortunately the sunrise didn’t appear, just a lightening misty greyness in the east. Disappointed, we moved on to Stanage Edge, Winnats Pass, and Padley Gorge as the sun broke through the mist, to take some great landscape images. On another occasion we set off for Whitby, at “silly o’clock” in the morning, for another sunrise shoot, this time being much more successful. Our reward for the early start was a glorious red sky as the sun rose over the seaward horizon. We ate bacon baps, and downed huge mugs of tea for an early breakfast in a “greasy spoon” café, before going on to take more photos around the picturesque Whitby quayside, and harbour. In July this year I accompanied Paul to Bridlington for a four-hour boat excursion along the coast to anchor offshore RSPB Bempton Cliffs to watch diving gannets catching fish thrown from the boat, the scene, and noise from those gannets was an incredible experience. Wonderful memories of Paul, he will be greatly missed by his family, friends, and the Society.

Good morning All Firstly my computer is not working at the moment, I am hoping to get it sorted just to retrieve the files on it. Hopefully will be sorted for next week. Last week at the club member Dave Turner gave a pdi presentation featuring Englands East coast from Northumberland to Norfolk. We were treated to some excellent photography from many places that were familiar to many of us but from maybe different angles to what we are used to seeing. The NEMPF exhibition results have been sent to me, as a club we had 7 accepted. This week, Wednesday 20th, we are holding our PDI of the year competition judged by LPA president Gail Wrigg. Regards Graham

One of our members, Dave Turner, an accomplished landscape photographer, took us on a pictorial journey down the east coast of England, from Northumberland, through Yorkshire, Lincolnshire, and finally Norfolk. I was especially taken with some of the images shot from different viewpoints, Lindisfarne castle viewed from the seaward side, Dunstanburgh Castle viewed across some vicious large beach boulders, and the Longstone Lighthouse viewed from the rocky foreshore. Of course, on the east coast of England some of the sunrises can be spectacular, as several of the displayed images showed. Small fishing communities such as Runswick Bay, and Staithes demonstrated how characterful the Yorkshire coast can be. In Lincolnshire, we viewed seal pups at Donna Nook, motorcycle sand racing at Mablethorpe, and the promenade at Cleethorpes. Our pictorial journey ended in Cromer with views of the pier. A big thank you to Dave for presenting a stunning collection of images, and it was interesting to learn some of his techniques in capturing these scenes. Thanks also to Dave Mann for the refreshments.

Arriving at Lincoln for our direct LNER Azuma service to London Kings Cross, I was surprised to find a Network Rail leaf treatment train, topped, and tailed by a pair of very dirty Class 66 locomotives, idling with it’s typical Class 66 rhythmic whistling sound, at the usual departure platform for our LNER service. The leaf clearing train consists of 5 tank wagons, and a compressor mounted on a flat bed wagon, this train travels along the track pressure washing the leaves, and leaf residue from the rails ensuring better grip for all rail traffic during the winter months. The following morning in London, my partner and family took me on a surprise visit to Battersea Power station, we had boarded the Underground Northern Line to Battersea Power Station Station on the recently opened Northern Line extension, not knowing where I was being led, I dutifully followed the family into the refurbished power station, this cavernous space has now been converted into a shopping centre. I was last here in 1968 to visit the working power station as a part of my electricians training course, and it’s very definitely changed since then. Led to the upper level of the shopping centre, I found that my birthday treat was a ride up a lift installed in one of the iconic power station chimneys. From the queue 20 people are moved forward to an exhibit area, then through a slowly opening door into an audio-visual show detailing some of the history of the power station, apparently the power station wasn’t bombed during the Second World War, as the chimneys were used as a navigation point by the Luftwaffe. After the audio-visual show, the group climbed 39 steps to the circular lift which elevated the group to the top of the chimney, the lift rises above the rim of the chimney, and glazed windows offer a 360 degree panoramic view over the London skyline. The windows had some raindrops on slightly obscuring the view, but that enabled me to capture this Monét style image. We completed the day with a lunchtime meal and travelled back to our base in Stratford using a fast Uber Boat catamaran down the river Thames to North Greenwich Pier for the Jubilee Line to Stratford.

Good Morning All Last week at the club we had a fascinating evening with Alan Harniess coming along to the club whilst visiting family in Louth. Alan showed us his two projects that he had completed photographing strangers he met in the street or pubs around the Birmingham area. There is a blog on our website explaining more. This week, Wednesday 13th, one of our members Dave Turner will be showing photographs from along England's East Coast. Don't forget to enter the PDI of the year if you have not already, the deadline is 6pm this Wednesday. Regards Graham

Our speaker last night was Alan Harniess, he spoke about his Flickr project “100 Strangers”, the intention was to photograph 100 Strangers around his home town of Birmingham. He often found it daunting to walk up to complete strangers in the street, and ask to take a photograph of them, often he retreated to a local public house for refreshment, and sometimes found subjects in there. Alan's collection of images that he showed represented a complete cross section of British society, young, old, beautiful, care worn, characterful, and ethnically diverse. Alan’s work was inspired by the eminent portrait photographer, Jane Bown, and he had one of her photographic books on display. After the break Alan showed images from his next project, “One Family”, he spoke about his dismay about negative media commentary on ethnicity, when his experience of talking, and watching people living their lives painted a completely different picture, people just living life, and making friends whilst being indifferent to colour, race, or religion. Alan’s collection of images with mixed race couples, or friends demonstrated the diversity of current British society. Thanks Alan for a fascinating talk, with some amazing imagery, perhaps his talk will inspire members to begin a project of their own.